7.4 Section B: The Facilitators Experience Of The Model 143
7.4.2 Professional Development 143
Professional development as covered and explained by various authors in chapter two can mean different things to different people. Although development usually connotes internally guided rather than externally compulsory changes, professional development is considered to be the result of a learning process which is directed at acquiring a coherent whole of the practical and theoretical knowledge, insight, attitude and repertory that teachers need for curriculum delivery (Vonk, 1991). In this study I argue for the peer- driven model of professional development with teachers exposed to a platform that allowed them to learn, develop and grow together regardless of race, gender, position, qualification and union affiliation. Stated below, are some of the comments lifted from some of the research tools used.
To my amazement I was introduced to training, which was learner-centred. We had to learn to share ideas. Everyone had to contribute. No matter (what) little information you bring about it was accepted. For the first time I was not afraid to be criticised, as long as it was a constructive criticism. It was a hands-on training and intensive, because were to be Teacher Trainers (Facilitators).
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At a class level: my teaching has become better and better. At first I used to teach English, but now I develop learners holistically. My teaching approach is continually improving.
Of importance from these expressions is the fact that these facilitators found the model to be useful as it allowed them space to grow and are now able to reflect on their classroom practice.
7.4.3 PERSONAL DEVELOPEMNT
Personal development as one of the themes that emerged from the data seemed to come up more frequently from the data collected. Professional learning is normally based on continuous reflection on one’s experience within a given context. Personal development as experienced by trainers in this model cannot be said to have taken place in isolation, but within the context of peer learning. (Fullan, 1991, p. 315) This is evident from the following comments:
As an individual I have learnt to teach in a manner that respects the dignity and rights of all persons without prejudice as to race, religious beliefs, colour, sex, physical characteristics, age and place of origin.
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Morton Andersen: I was one of the first cohorts of thirty school-based teachers trained by the Education Professionals from the Danish Education Ministry. This initial training, for me, was a life-affirming of my identity, building my-self-esteem, helped me shape my identity of myself (both personally and professionally). In short, due to the legacy of apartheid, my previously non-existent or restricted world-view of teaching and learning grew in leaps and bounds. From my limited vantage point at the time, this type of teacher development represented real empowerment, and a major paradigm shift. Key, firstly, in the shift, for me meant that I came to the realisation that I am important and unique.
Mangaliso: I’m not clear on the agency aspect. I'm clear on the growth aspect because I see growth in the model itself. I’m driven by the fact that I need to be capacitated enough in a particular way that would help my peers to then also grow. How that growth takes place is individualistic. It could never be the path that I followed. Whether that is something that will be parallel for them or is something that will be incidental for them or something that will be mimicry, or whatever it is, I cannot say how that happens for them.
Of note from these comments is the impact of the damage done by the previous education system that these participants seem to be reacting to. The model challenged the aspect of human rights and human dignity for participants to want to teach in a manner that addresses issues of respect and personal identities. As teachers, they now had confidence in affirming their images both as individuals and professionals with an added social responsibility: to respect human dignity. I view this as one of the most significant factors of the Ikhwezi model which coincided with the democratic policies teachers were introduced to in South Africa. It was a model that exposed teachers, for the first time, to an approach that said: You have the right to be yourself regardless of gender or race. Learners taught by teachers with this paradigm would certainly provide the right material for the young democracy that is South Africa.
7.4.4 TEAM TEACHING
Team teaching as part of professional development has its significance in teachers supporting one another by sharing and enhancing professional expertise. It is also one of the crucial aspects of the peer-driven model, in that most teachers within the South African context have never been exposed to this collaborative method, given the huge challenges of teacher-pupil ratio.
Remedy Zimu: At school where I am educating, I am able to work with colleagues as a team by implementing the skills that I have acquired from Ikhwezi Having three library science facilitators at our school is indeed an advantage because we share the same ideals, which are:
to improve the literacy skills at our school. Attending and conducting the course led to my reviving the library at my school.
From this comment, one cannot assume that true team teaching took place, but teachers were certainly able to work together in sharing professional knowledge as against delivering curriculum at classroom level. However, the exposure they had did contribute to them making a mind shift from operating in silos to working and interacting with other colleagues. This idea of working together within a school was made possible because all three teachers were trained within the Ikhwezi model and share similar backgrounds. This team spirit can be greatly enhanced if all teachers with a school community buys into teamwork as promoted by the Ikhwezi model.
Team teaching to the South African teachers was still an unfamiliar concept at the time of the project implementation. The ushering in of Curriculum 2005 (OBE) with its integrated approach, meant that teachers as trainers within this model had to change their teaching patterns. Admittedly in a number of schools, due to the current teacher-pupil ratio and high numbers, team teaching is still an ideal practice. What is important though is the fact that Ikhwezi was exposing teachers to a model where they were to practically experience the value, benefits, challenges and disadvantages of team teaching. Exposure of this nature would put teachers in a better position for them to understand what was to happen or not happen when they put their learners into groups as they delivered OBE. The exposure to teams during their training would hopefully have helped Ikhwezi-trained facilitators to understand the group dynamics that needed to be adhered to.
This would hopefully help them create an enabling learning classroom environment as against empty “noisy OBE classes” with learners bundled into groups with no clear guidelines in the absence of the full understanding of group dynamics.
7.4.5 CONFIDENCE IN INTERPRETING POLICIES
Confidence in curriculum delivery cannot be overemphasized as part of professional development.
At a school level: almost every teacher in my school has been to ICCE workshops on a number of occasions and that has benefited the school in terms of teaching and learning processes as well as in the implementation of the new transformational policies.
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In our school we have started using the RNCS documents. It was very easy to adapt in usage of these documents as we have mastered the usage of policy documents from workshops and training workshops at Ikhwezi College. I have shared all the knowledge I gained at the college with my colleagues. Sometimes I do encounter some problems when introducing some new information on OBE. There are conservatives who don’t like it or who are not prepared to change. It is very hard when that person is in a higher position or is a friend of a superior and the most influential to him.
But because of management skills we learned from the college some of the problems are solved automatically.
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My involvement at Ikhwezi has had a positive impact especially with the newly introduced OBE policy. I have been able to interpret and apply OBE policy with great ease using the skills and tools gained through my involvement from 1997 to date. I was able to tackle the national designed policy and practised it in my classroom. The hands-on approach of the Ikhwezi methods empowered me to tackle or
Democratic curriculum policies introduced aimed at replacing the apartheid curriculum had their own challenges. In addition to teachers having to understand, the philosophies they embraced, issues of language and OBE terminology frustrated and interfered with the grappling with and delivery of these policies.
7.4.6 FACILITATION SKILLS
Facilitation skills as part of professional development play a significant role especially in ensuring that learners are mostly engaged in one activity or another aimed at achieving the desired outcomes. This, as the newly introduced skill in the South African context, differs drastically from the traditional school environment where classroom teaching, was the norm. The highly teacher- centred pattern with little pupil initiative normally does not ensure pupil learning, as against a more decentralized classroom set up with learners able to use their initiative, while the teacher facilitates. Matthjssen (1984) Brown and McIntyre (1988)
Facilitators from their journals had the following to say after training:
When doing planning, sometimes they would be afraid to contribute and I would motivate them, telling them that it’s not like they know nothing. Whatever they thought, they should bring about.
I also told them that I’m also learning, it’s not like I’m a know-all. They became motivated, encouraged and were able to ask if there was a problem.
I have attended workshops given by the Department of Education, but their style of facilitating is different in that ICCE empowers people not to be afraid but to make mistakes and learn from them. It’s this that’s made teachers
want to attend the workshops that ICCE offers.
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It goes in line with the OBE approach as we have to work in groups. In the buzz groups we have to give activities for
participants. This helps them to unlock the knowledge they may have.
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For me it would be planning and support, so at Ikhwezi no one goes out for a workshop, whatever, without seeing to it that proper planning has been done, not an overnight or add-on kind of planning. So the material has to be there, and not just any material, but material of a particular standard, and then proofread to see to it that the material is worth its salt.
Magaqa Moosa: The highs of being involved at Ikhwezi, with being able to inspire and empower others and going out as a facilitator and making such an impact on those teachers out there, especially in the rural areas has been such an inspiration for me that, we were so motivated to go out on every workshop that was offered here, to go out there and make an impact on teachers, and it's amazing that without even being paid we want to do this because of the feedback that we were getting from these teachers.
Some of the comments that we got from our staff members was that “they must be getting paid to do this job because they are so enthusiastic about it”, but it was because of the feedback that we were getting from these teachers, that we actually touched something in them, and they then immediately signed on to be workshopped so that they could become facilitators, and we realised that there were so many people out there who wanted more, they wanted the challenge, they were motivated to do something different in their jobs. I felt that I had done something, if not touched anybody else, that I had done something in education.
7.4.7 REFLECTIVE PRACTICE
Reflective practice is noted by researchers such as Day (1999) and Schon (1998) to be an essential skill for PD programmes. South African teachers in the majority were never exposed to such skills in their initial teacher training programmes prior to the democratic government.
This is also one of the roles that teachers are expected to adopt as stipulated by the Norms and Standards for Educators (2002).
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“The HIV/AIDS workshop made me realize that we as managers needed a drastic change in our management style. We use to “block” teachers. Now I realized that we need one another to develop and enhance interaction”
Ms Dlaladlala
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Just a reflection on some of the workshops or seminars where people get feedback in terms of directly or indirectly assisting peers to begin to question themselves, and to begin cultivating their own initiation of growth if they were stagnant, or if they were idling or if they were not growing. I don’t know how that idea is contributing as far as maybe agency is concerned, because people would say “I didn’t know that I had to begin developing myself”, comments like that. After this workshop one thing I learned is that I need to begin developing myself. I didn’t know that because I always thought development would come from somewhere. (Morton Andersen)
7.4.8 CHALLENGES
Perceptions and negative attitudes by school managers towards Ikhwezi CPTD activities Things were not easy for me when I went back to school. I encountered many problems, one being my principal. She had a negative attitude towards Ikhwezi. She wouldn’t allow me to help my colleagues who were in the Foundation Phase. Somehow I could help the individuals who would come to me and ask for assistance. This went on until the training of the Intermediate Phase. Since I was in the Intermediate Phase during that time, she had no choice because the Deputy Principal and the HOD forced her to allow me to workshop the Intermediate Phase teachers (Ms Khanda from Chaza Primary School)
CPTD activities met with negativity by colleagues
Teachers were negatively affected by a number of things with the introduction of many policy changes in the new democratic dispensation. They mostly felt challenged by huge number of learners, thus increasing their workloads. There were many and various workshops coming from all directions, mostly without necessary support, thus making them frustrated and tired.
I was disillusioned when my desire to conduct workshops at school in order to empower my colleagues was met with negativity. Teachers were not willing to attend workshops outside school time. Even when workshops were scheduled to finish before 2.30 pm. Teachers felt too tired and distracted to participate actively. Some teachers were not prepared to do anything ‘extra’ that was required of them. Thus with my enthusiasm dying a slow death, I decided to influence close friends and those that were interested in professional development and wanted to grow. I have thus far been able to persuade three of my colleagues to attend workshops. They have now joined the ICCE family as facilitators. Encouraging teachers to become professionally empowered is not an easy task. It is only those who have a strong desire to improve themselves as teachers, who will follow this path. (Remedy Zimu: Mvela Primary School
Major challenges were in the school leadership styles with principals not giving educators the CPD support they needed. Trained facilitators, wanting to be agents of change, with the aim of sharing acquired expertise, were frustrated by no support with the department of education having no clear CPTD policy in place. Facilitator’s
Engagement with PD programmes at Ikhwezi was more of a personal engagement with no systemic support as policy.
What I would like to see materialising is probably through Ikhwezi’s input that facilitators be recognised by the district and be given the time to do the facilitation, because for us as teachers it becomes a personal struggle with our managers to get that time off, and some of us have left school at three o'clock immediately with our baggage, travelled for three and a half hours and started a workshop immediately, right into the night. This is just because of our desire to inspire others and to really sustain this programme and because of our gratitude to Peggy for all the work that she has done, but sometimes with the politics within the schools it becomes difficult to be released and to be able to do the work that we want to do.
7.5 SECTION C: COLLECTIVE EMERGING THEMES ON THE IKHWEZI PEER- DRIVEN MODEL
The following session covers the analysis of data from a group of facilitators trained at different levels and in different areas of specialization obtained through the focus group interview. The purpose of this exercise was to establish the extent to which the teachers share the same opportunities and challenges presented by the Ikhwezi peer-driven model of teacher development.
Due to the length of inputs, the teachers’ responses are summarised. However the entire data source are available in the appendices section.
Teachers’ previous exposure to professional development activities.
All teachers that participated in this focus group interview had previously participated in professional development activities organised by external agencies. However they found this model of TPD to be a different experience from the other CPTD activities. They found this (Ikhwezi approach) to be informative, challenging and hand-on. It promoted a different learner-centred approach promoting care and support rather than content. It also promoted a critical self-reflection process. The model required, as mandatory, teamwork and co- facilitation.
Major factors acknowledge was the different learner- centred style, with them as important people in the process and not the facilitators. They noted that the facilitation style- the whole approached made them to be reflective and critical of themselves as well. Emphasis was also made of the fact that it was teachers as people familiar with the challenges on the ground, who were capacitated to train others.
Another distinguishing feature was in the fact that they were to co—facilitate and work in teams, mixing with other races, officials at different levels. In other instances managers and teachers had to work together ignoring the issue of levels and ranks
Majority of facilitators were very keen to come back to the excitement initially experienced in their first week/days of PD. As it was the initial stages of policy changes countrywide, those who in their schools had to deal with multicultural classes for the first time were thrilled. This coming back gave them an opportunity to mix with teachers from other races, thus allowing them space to talk about some of cultural challenges they were experiencing from their learners.
Challenges experienced by teachers
Respondents noted this as one of the challenges with no substitutes to help with their school programmes while they went on training. This was the area that challenged the employer with no clear policy on CPD. The incoming NPFTD( 2007) will hopefully address the issue on school- based PD programmes.
General concerns were in the fact that there were no support structures for school-based PD.
Managers were mostly not supportive, with some feeling threatened by powerful, capacitated and knowledgeable teachers. Teachers, in general were desponded and or too busy , inundated by numerous policy changes, with no time for any other activities.
Facilitators who had their school principals involved, generally did not have major problems, as compared to those that did not know about Ikhwezi or did not embrace PD. Some teachers, for example, Remedy (one of the research participant), depite the lack of interest within her school, resorted to working with just her friends so as not to dampen her excitement and interest. Others, like Ms Makhanda from uMlazi , a Township South of Duran had to share her skills with neighbouring schools, until her colleagues saw the light.
Of prominence as a concern was the lack of PD support structures at school level with some managers resisting change. Lack of substitutes to support teachers as they go for development was another major concern. Morton Andersen’s (a research participant) major concern was the lack of mechanisms to sustain trained facilitators. The fact that not all facilitators were pulling the same weight was also a concern for him. In trying to understand facilitator’s lack of commitment to develop material, he thought this could be alluded to lack of capacity for material development, more than lack of interest. The issue of Ikhwezi’s identity was raised with some principals and officials still thinking of it as an NGO. Lack of proper communication from the Department of Education at the point of absorption of the pilot project could be the main factor in this regard.